How to end the tearing Cinnamon on NVIDIA

NVIDIA offers the most powerful solution in terms of graphics processing for GNU/Linux, however, it can often end up being the most headache for a clean and hassle-free experience.

This theme is something that is found in different forums, whether for KDE, Ubuntu Unity or the Pillars of Eternity video game.

Although it is a situation that is gradually improving, it is clear that the GPU giant still has aspects to improve in its support for GNU/Linux, and that is that now GNOME is shown as the only environment capable of offering an experience clean out of the box from the first moment.

This time we are going to discuss Cinnamon, the popular desktop environment that Linux Linux has in its reference distribution (and possibly its best implementation).

Those who use this environment on NVIDIA and its official driver may end up perceiving excessive tearing, which can end up being quite annoying.

This is because, if the Linux Mint driver manager is used, in addition to the driver, NVIDIA Prime is also installed, the alternative utility to Optimus that allows to exchange between an Intel IGP and an NVIDIA GPU.

Although NVIDIA Prime can be a good alternative to Optimus, it presents the problem that it generates a lot of tearing, even apparently in graphics and configurations where the GPU can not be changed (use a GTX 1050 on an AMD Ryzen).

Luckily, to correct that you just have to prevent the start of NVIDIA Prime through the configuration of the Cinnamon startup applications.

After this, restart the session, or in extreme case also the computer, it would have to be enough to greatly reduce the tearing in Cinnamon on NVIDIA. True, the problem is not corrected 100%, but the improvement is very appreciable and ends up making it anecdotal.